There's no getting around it, the film
42 is a relic. I could make a half-assed Indiana Jones joke here,
but... nah.This is a movie straight out of the
early 90's, but the thing is, it's still a remarkable film from
the early 90's. The opening scene with Ford's tin eared “old
codger” voice talking about how it's time to integrate pro baseball
while bathed in bronze quasi-holy light is as hokey as they come. I
was ready to bail, that is, until the film's namesake finally made
his entrance.
Chadwick Boseman plays Jackie Robinson like his entire career was leading
to this role while never tipping his hand to the audience of any
shred of desperation. He is beyond exceptional and I suspect we will
being seeing much more of him in the future. When Jackie makes it to the
bigs we feel for him, when he laughs we laugh with him, when his heart breaks under the daily barrage of bigotry so do ours. I hate
to use the phrase “a star is born” but he has, and with the help
of his equally compelling wife in actor Nicole
Beharie we cross the line from a passable project to an labor of
love. Sure you have to sit through the obligatory
proposal/marriage/”you're special” pep talks, but thankfully the
two get to share a couple touching left field (sorry) moments
that spice the pacing up when it needs it most. And to be fair the
final pep talk is all kinds of adora-awesome, which is now, obviously
a word.
The supporting cast is a mixed bag of swings and misses (I'm so sorry). Christopher
Meloni has a nice run for the first quarter as the manager that
has to knock the less agreeable Dodgers into line and Alan
Tudyk absolutely nails the thankless role of Ben Chapman. As the
most outwardly racist caricature in a film chock full of the suckers,
he's a flesh and blood Yosemite Sam. That may sound like a
knock, but seriously, he is an entirely convincing Yosemite Sam. But
we need to talk about Ford.
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He's bad, really really
bad. There's a stuffy odor of white man's burden around the
character on paper and his forced voice always broke my immersion. He hasn't been a character actor before, to my
knowledge, and this is proof positive as to why he never should be
again. That’s not to say he doesn’t have a good arch or that his
voice does eventually become kind of endearing, but he wears you down
instead of winning you over. If half of his scenes were cut it would
have been a better film.
You can usually tell when a film is
made by people who wanted to be there versus when it was more of an
obligation and 42 is definitely the former. It's a good story with
good casting with a familiar yet affecting path to the end credits.
Yes it's hokey, yes Ford is painfully miscast, and yes the racism is
more than a little melodramatic. But you know what? I'd bet money on
that part of American history being just as melodramatic as this film
depicts it. And for every go nowhere scene with the Dodger
malcontents there’s one with Jackie and Rachel, which is more than
worth it. Also the scene near the end with a small white child
reacting to a racist crowd was appropriately dark and showed a draft
of a much better film that was probably sanitized...probably. I loved that scene and I really liked
this movie. It's not a showstopping grand slam (SORRY!)
but rather an honest, heartfelt double play. (I have a
problem...)
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| That's the real Rachel in a picture that made my whole damn week. |
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